(12-14-2017 01:37 PM)memtiger1987 Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 01:12 PM)salukiblue Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 01:00 PM)72Tiger Wrote:  Thanks for the transcription. Parrish doesn't like 'Tubby ball' if you want to call it that. No matter the results, he wouldn't like it. Not his style and not something that is easy to write articles about because Tubby is not a media friendly coach.

I like 'Tubby ball'. By Tubby ball I mean the four year guys built up over time. I don't care too much about the big splash recruiting drama, don't follow any of that on twitter, look at rankings, etc.

That said, there are plenty of coaches who play 'Tubby ball'. We could have hired a better one IMO. We have Tubby tho, and I'd love for it to work. I'm a long term thinker by nature. I know I'm in the minority, and I'm not trying to change opinions.

Parrish is crapping all over Tubby. Been doing it -by his own admission - even before this season started. I don't care for it. It's lazy IMO. Write an article about the strengths and weaknesses of the team maybe? Or just throw a bunch of gas on the fire when it's good and hot and there are lots of eager faces looking to see how big the flames can get.

Final point - When we fire Tubby and go with a guy more like what everyone wants, I'll get on board with that. I just like this way better. It suits my style.

You're welcome.

My only counter to you're liking Tubby Ball is that Tubby isn't doing Tubby ball.

Instead of LOADING up on frosh this past 2017 class (and maybe a traditional sit-a-year transfer) he went the 2-yr player route. I would have cut him a lot more slack had he just done that instead.

That is the antithesis of "building" a team with four year players.

He could have added a bunch in 2016, too. There are always kids out there in April/May that could become decent 4-year players. Hell, we had 5 open schollies last year.

Memphis will likely have huge turnover in 2019--losing at least six guys, which will require a hard reset. Is that when "Tubbyball" will actually commence? If so, that means his plan won't come to fruition until year six, even though he's only under contract for 5 years.

Please tell me about all of these top freshmen that were available after the team imploded? Not alot left in April, and those that are have dozens of offers from high end programs.

Some of your other criticisms are valid, but I think he did a great job fielding a team after things blew up. I think Tubby should have shown this same energy after he was hired, a couple of Davenport type guys could have added depth to that team.

Every freshman was available for 2017. Even before Tubby completely torched the program there were scholarships available with loads of playing time available playing for a team with a solid nucleus.

Quote:I think he did a great job fielding a team after things blew up.

He blew it up and by March of 2019, we lose 7 of our top 8 scorers from a team that is barely scraping by against mid majors; most of whom have been missing their best players.

Tubby has done the opposite of good in every situation. I don't like Parrish but I agree with him here. Choose which one you want to be out of the 3 options.

(12-14-2017 01:37 PM)memtiger1987 Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 01:12 PM)salukiblue Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 01:00 PM)72Tiger Wrote:  Thanks for the transcription. Parrish doesn't like 'Tubby ball' if you want to call it that. No matter the results, he wouldn't like it. Not his style and not something that is easy to write articles about because Tubby is not a media friendly coach.

I like 'Tubby ball'. By Tubby ball I mean the four year guys built up over time. I don't care too much about the big splash recruiting drama, don't follow any of that on twitter, look at rankings, etc.

That said, there are plenty of coaches who play 'Tubby ball'. We could have hired a better one IMO. We have Tubby tho, and I'd love for it to work. I'm a long term thinker by nature. I know I'm in the minority, and I'm not trying to change opinions.

Parrish is crapping all over Tubby. Been doing it -by his own admission - even before this season started. I don't care for it. It's lazy IMO. Write an article about the strengths and weaknesses of the team maybe? Or just throw a bunch of gas on the fire when it's good and hot and there are lots of eager faces looking to see how big the flames can get.

Final point - When we fire Tubby and go with a guy more like what everyone wants, I'll get on board with that. I just like this way better. It suits my style.

You're welcome.

My only counter to you're liking Tubby Ball is that Tubby isn't doing Tubby ball.

Instead of LOADING up on frosh this past 2017 class (and maybe a traditional sit-a-year transfer) he went the 2-yr player route. I would have cut him a lot more slack had he just done that instead.

That is the antithesis of "building" a team with four year players.

He could have added a bunch in 2016, too. There are always kids out there in April/May that could become decent 4-year players. Hell, we had 5 open schollies last year.

Memphis will likely have huge turnover in 2019--losing at least six guys, which will require a hard reset. Is that when "Tubbyball" will actually commence? If so, that means his plan won't come to fruition until year six, even though he's only under contract for 5 years.

Please tell me about all of these top freshmen that were available after the team imploded? Not alot left in April, and those that are have dozens of offers from high end programs.

Some of your other criticisms are valid, but I think he did a great job fielding a team after things blew up. I think Tubby should have shown this same energy after he was hired, a couple of Davenport type guys could have added depth to that team.

Telly me where is wanted "top freshmen?"

In fact, you are just trying to pick a nit, because in my "want" above all I looked for was "decent 4-year players."

And that brings me to just one more critique of this staff: they don't work 24/7.

At Tech, they only had two spots open for 2016, Clergeot and some JUCO guy filled the spots in the early period. Apparently, at that point, Tubby and staff dusted their hands off and took the rest of the year off from recruiting. Because when they came to Memphis, they had absolutely no recruits go after besides the one they stole from their old school.

The same problem this year. They get the three in the early period, get in on a couple JUCO's but then have no other connections and leads for frosh once 65% of the team suddenly leaves. They should never have that issue.

I'm sure there was a Vanover type (300+ recruit) available in 2016. Hell, I'm sure we can look at Hoopdreams old recruiting thread where he did more work than the staff to bring up names of available players.

(12-14-2017 01:36 PM)Tiger1983 Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 12:00 PM)jgardne Wrote:  That's pretty amazing that Pastner's worst KenPom rating was 90.

I am surprised. I thought it would be a higher number (around 120 or so).

...and that was the team that lost to Arizona in the NCAAt. (His last team's kenpom was 75).

(12-14-2017 03:05 PM)salukiblue Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 01:37 PM)memtiger1987 Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 01:12 PM)salukiblue Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 01:00 PM)72Tiger Wrote:  Thanks for the transcription. Parrish doesn't like 'Tubby ball' if you want to call it that. No matter the results, he wouldn't like it. Not his style and not something that is easy to write articles about because Tubby is not a media friendly coach.

I like 'Tubby ball'. By Tubby ball I mean the four year guys built up over time. I don't care too much about the big splash recruiting drama, don't follow any of that on twitter, look at rankings, etc.

That said, there are plenty of coaches who play 'Tubby ball'. We could have hired a better one IMO. We have Tubby tho, and I'd love for it to work. I'm a long term thinker by nature. I know I'm in the minority, and I'm not trying to change opinions.

Parrish is crapping all over Tubby. Been doing it -by his own admission - even before this season started. I don't care for it. It's lazy IMO. Write an article about the strengths and weaknesses of the team maybe? Or just throw a bunch of gas on the fire when it's good and hot and there are lots of eager faces looking to see how big the flames can get.

Final point - When we fire Tubby and go with a guy more like what everyone wants, I'll get on board with that. I just like this way better. It suits my style.

You're welcome.

My only counter to you're liking Tubby Ball is that Tubby isn't doing Tubby ball.

Instead of LOADING up on frosh this past 2017 class (and maybe a traditional sit-a-year transfer) he went the 2-yr player route. I would have cut him a lot more slack had he just done that instead.

That is the antithesis of "building" a team with four year players.

He could have added a bunch in 2016, too. There are always kids out there in April/May that could become decent 4-year players. Hell, we had 5 open schollies last year.

Memphis will likely have huge turnover in 2019--losing at least six guys, which will require a hard reset. Is that when "Tubbyball" will actually commence? If so, that means his plan won't come to fruition until year six, even though he's only under contract for 5 years.

Please tell me about all of these top freshmen that were available after the team imploded? Not alot left in April, and those that are have dozens of offers from high end programs.

Some of your other criticisms are valid, but I think he did a great job fielding a team after things blew up. I think Tubby should have shown this same energy after he was hired, a couple of Davenport type guys could have added depth to that team.

Telly me where is wanted "top freshmen?"

In fact, you are just trying to pick a nit, because in my "want" above all I looked for was "decent 4-year players."

And that brings me to just one more critique of this staff: they don't work 24/7.

At Tech, they only had two spots open for 2016, Clergeot and some JUCO guy filled the spots in the early period. Apparently, at that point, Tubby and staff dusted their hands off and took the rest of the year off from recruiting. Because when they came to Memphis, they had absolutely no recruits go after besides the one they stole from their old school.

The same problem this year. They get the three in the early period, get in on a couple JUCO's but then have no other connections and leads for frosh once 65% of the team suddenly leaves. They should never have that issue.

I'm sure there was a Vanover type (300+ recruit) available in 2016. Hell, I'm sure we can look at Hoopdreams old recruiting thread where he did more work than the staff to bring up names of available players.

And Tubby absolutely did go on a two week vacation when he got the job; NOT to be confused with the 2 year vacation he has been on. He actually went on vacation with the clock ticking big time and scholarships galore available.

Quote:He was somewhat under the radar shortly after taking the job, he said, to honor a vacation commitment he’d had been postponing for several years. When he returned, it was back to restoring a roster that had only seven scholarship players.

What kind of a coach or a human being who is hired at twice his salary, with barely enough players to field a team, in good conscience takes a two week vacation? This, hiring Saul and his famous "Memphis isn't what it used to be 10 years ago" comment should have told anyone who had a doubt what kind of a lazy has been Tubby is.

(12-14-2017 03:08 PM)Stammers Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 03:05 PM)salukiblue Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 01:37 PM)memtiger1987 Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 01:12 PM)salukiblue Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 01:00 PM)72Tiger Wrote:  Thanks for the transcription. Parrish doesn't like 'Tubby ball' if you want to call it that. No matter the results, he wouldn't like it. Not his style and not something that is easy to write articles about because Tubby is not a media friendly coach.

I like 'Tubby ball'. By Tubby ball I mean the four year guys built up over time. I don't care too much about the big splash recruiting drama, don't follow any of that on twitter, look at rankings, etc.

That said, there are plenty of coaches who play 'Tubby ball'. We could have hired a better one IMO. We have Tubby tho, and I'd love for it to work. I'm a long term thinker by nature. I know I'm in the minority, and I'm not trying to change opinions.

Parrish is crapping all over Tubby. Been doing it -by his own admission - even before this season started. I don't care for it. It's lazy IMO. Write an article about the strengths and weaknesses of the team maybe? Or just throw a bunch of gas on the fire when it's good and hot and there are lots of eager faces looking to see how big the flames can get.

Final point - When we fire Tubby and go with a guy more like what everyone wants, I'll get on board with that. I just like this way better. It suits my style.

You're welcome.

My only counter to you're liking Tubby Ball is that Tubby isn't doing Tubby ball.

Instead of LOADING up on frosh this past 2017 class (and maybe a traditional sit-a-year transfer) he went the 2-yr player route. I would have cut him a lot more slack had he just done that instead.

That is the antithesis of "building" a team with four year players.

He could have added a bunch in 2016, too. There are always kids out there in April/May that could become decent 4-year players. Hell, we had 5 open schollies last year.

Memphis will likely have huge turnover in 2019--losing at least six guys, which will require a hard reset. Is that when "Tubbyball" will actually commence? If so, that means his plan won't come to fruition until year six, even though he's only under contract for 5 years.

Please tell me about all of these top freshmen that were available after the team imploded? Not alot left in April, and those that are have dozens of offers from high end programs.

Some of your other criticisms are valid, but I think he did a great job fielding a team after things blew up. I think Tubby should have shown this same energy after he was hired, a couple of Davenport type guys could have added depth to that team.

Telly me where is wanted "top freshmen?"

In fact, you are just trying to pick a nit, because in my "want" above all I looked for was "decent 4-year players."

And that brings me to just one more critique of this staff: they don't work 24/7.

At Tech, they only had two spots open for 2016, Clergeot and some JUCO guy filled the spots in the early period. Apparently, at that point, Tubby and staff dusted their hands off and took the rest of the year off from recruiting. Because when they came to Memphis, they had absolutely no recruits go after besides the one they stole from their old school.

The same problem this year. They get the three in the early period, get in on a couple JUCO's but then have no other connections and leads for frosh once 65% of the team suddenly leaves. They should never have that issue.

I'm sure there was a Vanover type (300+ recruit) available in 2016. Hell, I'm sure we can look at Hoopdreams old recruiting thread where he did more work than the staff to bring up names of available players.

And Tubby absolutely did go on a two week vacation when he got the job; NOT to be confused with the 2 year vacation he has been on. He actually went on vacation with the clock ticking big time and scholarships galore available.

Quote:He was somewhat under the radar shortly after taking the job, he said, to honor a vacation commitment he’d had been postponing for several years. When he returned, it was back to restoring a roster that had only seven scholarship players.

What kind of a coach or a human being who is hired at twice his salary, with barely enough players to field a team, in good conscience takes a two week vacation? This, hiring Saul and his famous "Memphis isn't what it used to be 10 years ago" comment should have told anyone who had a doubt what kind of a lazy has been Tubby is.

None of that would have mattered, if he had not been blindsided by the Lawsons. They should have stayed and showed some loyalty to Tubby and the city. Their exit was planned to cause maximum damage to the program. Same as when Austin Nichols left in the middle of the summer after the recruiting season was over. That is why you only recruit role players from Memphis.

(12-14-2017 03:48 PM)Smith Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 03:08 PM)Stammers Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 03:05 PM)salukiblue Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 01:37 PM)memtiger1987 Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 01:12 PM)salukiblue Wrote:  You're welcome.

My only counter to you're liking Tubby Ball is that Tubby isn't doing Tubby ball.

Instead of LOADING up on frosh this past 2017 class (and maybe a traditional sit-a-year transfer) he went the 2-yr player route. I would have cut him a lot more slack had he just done that instead.

That is the antithesis of "building" a team with four year players.

He could have added a bunch in 2016, too. There are always kids out there in April/May that could become decent 4-year players. Hell, we had 5 open schollies last year.

Memphis will likely have huge turnover in 2019--losing at least six guys, which will require a hard reset. Is that when "Tubbyball" will actually commence? If so, that means his plan won't come to fruition until year six, even though he's only under contract for 5 years.

Please tell me about all of these top freshmen that were available after the team imploded? Not alot left in April, and those that are have dozens of offers from high end programs.

Some of your other criticisms are valid, but I think he did a great job fielding a team after things blew up. I think Tubby should have shown this same energy after he was hired, a couple of Davenport type guys could have added depth to that team.

Telly me where is wanted "top freshmen?"

In fact, you are just trying to pick a nit, because in my "want" above all I looked for was "decent 4-year players."

And that brings me to just one more critique of this staff: they don't work 24/7.

At Tech, they only had two spots open for 2016, Clergeot and some JUCO guy filled the spots in the early period. Apparently, at that point, Tubby and staff dusted their hands off and took the rest of the year off from recruiting. Because when they came to Memphis, they had absolutely no recruits go after besides the one they stole from their old school.

The same problem this year. They get the three in the early period, get in on a couple JUCO's but then have no other connections and leads for frosh once 65% of the team suddenly leaves. They should never have that issue.

I'm sure there was a Vanover type (300+ recruit) available in 2016. Hell, I'm sure we can look at Hoopdreams old recruiting thread where he did more work than the staff to bring up names of available players.

And Tubby absolutely did go on a two week vacation when he got the job; NOT to be confused with the 2 year vacation he has been on. He actually went on vacation with the clock ticking big time and scholarships galore available.

Quote:He was somewhat under the radar shortly after taking the job, he said, to honor a vacation commitment he’d had been postponing for several years. When he returned, it was back to restoring a roster that had only seven scholarship players.

What kind of a coach or a human being who is hired at twice his salary, with barely enough players to field a team, in good conscience takes a two week vacation? This, hiring Saul and his famous "Memphis isn't what it used to be 10 years ago" comment should have told anyone who had a doubt what kind of a lazy has been Tubby is.

None of that would have mattered, if he had not been blindsided by the Lawsons. They should have stayed and showed some loyalty to Tubby and the city. Their exit was planned to cause maximum damage to the program. Same as when Austin Nichols left in the middle of the summer after the recruiting season was over. That is why you only recruit role players from Memphis.

The Nichols deal is a Josh lie. Tubby dissed Keelon. Try again.

(12-14-2017 01:00 PM)72Tiger Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 12:27 PM)salukiblue Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 12:07 PM)72Tiger Wrote:  Parrish like stirring the pot. Much easier role than actually researching and writing a well thought out article.

Did you even listen?

Here's a part of the transcript. It isn't perfectly translated, so it's not precise word for word correct.

It sounds VERY well researched and thought out.

Seth laid out a lot of the things that we have laid out on this show. About misses in recruiting. The transfers. The tigers' loss at the end of last season. How the roster is well below any normal Memphis historical standard. Attendance is well below any normal Memphis historical standard, in fact the Memphis attendance inside FedEx Forum is at an all time low. A modern era low. The lowest of my lifetime and projects to finish that way. As well it's just it's all bad stuff. And I'm not even saying that enthusiastically.

Or I know because it's just all bad stuff. I'm sick. When Josh Pastner was nudged out the door to go to Georgia Tech, things were obviously not good in a variety of ways. Recruiting had dropped off transfers had picked, up the winning had slipped. Back to back misses for the NCAA tournament, none of that is is untrue. But we talked about it at the time. I was on record saying Josh Pastner and Memphis need to divorce. I thought that they were probably gonna have to be like a couple that stays married just because neither one of them can afford to be divorced. But then Georgia Tech's swooped in and Memphis lowered the buyout and was able to nudge Josh Pastner out the door.

Things were bad in that moment. That was a good day for the University of Memphis and a good day for Josh Pastner, I thought. That's all true. This is also true... in every way you measure a basketball program things have gotten worse since then: attendance, recruiting, season ticket sales, rankings-- everything. You know Josh Pastner's worst kenpom ranking ever was 90th. Tubby Smith's first team finished outside the top 100. Right now they're 152. In every way you measure a basketball program, the Memphis program has gotten incredibly worse in every department without exception since Tubby Smith took over.

This isn't even an argument anymore. I don't even understand how anybody could put up a counter argument to it. I can bring you all the numbers, all the facts. You can't argue against facts. At this point if you're arguing against anything that I'm saying you're either just stubborn to a fault, interested in just being different because you like to be different, or too dumb to understand the argument. You pick. It doesn't matter to me. I'll let you pick which of the three.

And what Seth was able to do is share that with a national audience, which is something frankly I had not done. I could've written this Memphis basketball column at any point. I don't have much interest in writing that for CBS sports now. I figure we'll get to a day where I will write it. And it'll have whatever impact it has. I sometimes people say oh you're gonna write another bad Memphis column I've written one that negative Tubby Smith column in my entire life or I should rephrase it I think I might have written one back when he was at Kentucky, but since Tubby Smith has been the head coach of the University of Memphis I've written one negative Tubby Smith--that's the truth-- and it was after the Lawson's left and they were losing all of the transfers and replacing them with sub 150 prospects. And junior college players.

The reason I wrote that column then is because I knew what this was gonna look like in November/December. I'm not a psychic, I'm just also not an idiot. So while some people were trying to spin it into "you know the Lawson's were a cancer and we'll be better off without them and you don't know how good the JUCO players will be". I consistently said you don't know what you're talking about. Here's what's coming and now here we are. And so, the only people pushing back now fall in the one of those categories" too stubborn to a fault, interested in being different for the sake of being different, or too dumb to understand the argument. Too dumb to understand context.

Anybody with a brain who understands the sport of college basketball looks at what's happening with the Memphis basketball program and reaches the same conclusion I reached the same conclusions that Seth Davis wrote. And detailed in that column this morning. There's no other way to interpret it. And yet there are still a few who will jump on Facebook or on Twitter and and there was one young guy on Facebook earlier today, after I posted that davis' column, and he said "Yo they beat Albany last night. They're 7-2 now. So what is the problem?" And the point I've made to him is yeah they're 7-2 but what does it mean?

Georgetown undefeated right now what does it me right now? Nothing. Doesn't meaning anything. When you are high major program with incredible resources who plays these types of buy games now you can make your record whatever you wanna make your record until conference play starts, then you've got to play who the league tells you to play. (Brad) "I watched Mississippi State get blown out by Cincinnati last last night." Another good example. Now Mississippi State has put together a nice record--they were undefeated. I had State fans tweeting me "why isn't state ranked? Because they had not done anything. But they've beaten nobody. Those wins don't mean anything. State might might prove to be a good team but don't let it undefeated record until yesterday make you think it's a good thing then they go play a real team for the first time in and they get handled pretty easily.

Memphis is the exact same situation right now it is true they beat Albany last night. Then I got a message last night--"what are you gonna say about this?" Good, okay I think? I guess I would say beating Albany is better than losing to Albany, so like congratulations. But. Wow if we got to a point where we're Memphis fans are celebrating--if we get to the point at this point you take any win you can take, I'm not trying to pretend otherwise. But if we reached the point wirh Memphis basketball where you're celebrating victories over America east schools and not even like the best American schools. Like you you're proving my points. You're proving my point. The issue with the last night isn't that Memphis beat Albany or that Memphis could've lost Albany. Whatever the result, whatever the result is a forty minute basketball game. The issue if you wanna get right to a core of it is that Memphis basketball was only a one point favorite over Albany. Inside FedEx Forum. That should never happen. Your program should never get to a place where all the metrics and Las Vegas oddsmakers say the University of Memphis is only a one point favorite or two point favorite over Albany. Inside FedEx Forum. Once that point spread is placed on that game that tells you all you need to know about the where the university of Memphis basketball program is right now.

It's what I've been saying for months is what's Davis wrote this morning. But 7-2. Some people are happy with it. Here's what I would tell you about that 7-2 record. The seven wins have come against Little Rock, New Orleans, northern Kentucky, Mercer, Samford, Bryant, and Albany. And four of those seven teams or I should take three of the seven teams were literally missing their best player. If you combine those teams--the seven teams that Memphis has beaten, you get an average kenpom ranking of 205.6. That's what the seven wins have come against. Against teams that have an average kenpom ranking of 205.6.

The seven teams that Memphis has beaten again--Little Rock, New Orleans, northern Kentucky, Mercer, Samford, Bryant, and Albany have so far combined to play eleven different top 100 kenpom teams. You wanna guess what the record is against those top 100 Kempom teams? They played eleven games and you wanna guess what the record is? Eleven games now. 0-11. They've played eleven top 100 kenpom teams--the teams that Memphis has beaten and they've lost every single time. So that's the context of the seven and two record it doesn't mean anything.

It's not even good relative to the very low preseason expectations. Ready for this--here's proof. In the preseason they were ranked at 132nd at kenpom. The University of Memphis Tigers were. 132, which by the way should never be the case of the University of Memphis. Josh Pastners lowest point wasn't anywhere close to 132 at kenpom. The low point where you wanted Josh Pastner fired and were willing to insist that the university should pay ten million dollars to make it happen. They were never close to 132 at kenpom, but that's where they were in the preseason this season. You know they are now after nine games? 151/152.

They've actually performed at a level below what they were expected to perform even relative to the preseason expectations that were already low. They are 3-4 against the spread. They've dropped thirty places in kenpom even with the wins, even by going 7-2. So there's no way to look at this information intelligently and try to spin it into something positive. That's a dumb man's game. I don't mind if you wanna be dumb. Just don't ever expect me to be dumb with you. You can be dumb if you want to and celebrate wins over Albany and try to pretend that the 7-2 record mean something. You can be dumb about it if you want to, just do it got ask me to be dumb with you. I'm not interested in that.

Now the good news is that on Saturday if you want to prove your a real team, you've got an opportunity. On a neutral court against a real opponent. I don't think louisville as good as it was supposed to be. A lot of that have to do with their highest rated freshman was ruled ineligible. And they replaced one of the greatest coaches of all time with a 32 year old first year head coach--you know like that matters. And so I don't think Louisville is a legitimate top ten team or top twenty or right now probably top 25 team. Louisville is still good, they've got good players. So if you think this is a formula that the University of Memphis is using, this is formula to be competitive at the level at which Memphis basketball is supposed to be competitive, at the level at which your program that pays the coach three million dollars a year is supposed to be competitive. Well, Saturday your opportunity to prove it. To be clear if they beat Louisville on Saturday. I will think it says more about Louisville than it says about Memphis. It won't make me change my big views about the Memphis basketball program. But at least you'll be able to say "don't say we can't beat anybody with this roster right doing it this way, we just knocked out the Louisville cardinals in New York." The opportunity's on Saturday we'll throw the ball up and play for forty minutes.

Thanks for the transcription. Parrish doesn't like 'Tubby ball' if you want to call it that. No matter the results, he wouldn't like it. Not his style and not something that is easy to write articles about because Tubby is not a media friendly coach.

I like 'Tubby ball'. By Tubby ball I mean the four year guys built up over time. I don't care too much about the big splash recruiting drama, don't follow any of that on twitter, look at rankings, etc.

That said, there are plenty of coaches who play 'Tubby ball'. We could have hired a better one IMO. We have Tubby tho, and I'd love for it to work. I'm a long term thinker by nature. I know I'm in the minority, and I'm not trying to change opinions.

Parrish is crapping all over Tubby. Been doing it -by his own admission - even before this season started. I don't care for it. It's lazy IMO. Write an article about the strengths and weaknesses of the team maybe? Or just throw a bunch of gas on the fire when it's good and hot and there are lots of eager faces looking to see how big the flames can get.

Final point - When we fire Tubby and go with a guy more like what everyone wants, I'll get on board with that. I just like this way better. It suits my style.

True, there are numerous coaches, some with less experience than Tubby, that are winning at NCAAT with 3 and 4 year guys and without the 5* splash ala, Kentucky, Duke, Kansas. GP actually named coaches who have a reputation of recruiting the "right way" that still land solid 3 and 4*s. He specifically mentioned Michigan, Wisconsin, UVA yesterday. There are also schools that hired new coaches the exact same time as Memphis hired Tubby. He's mentioned the recruiting wins by the staffs at Vandy, TCU, UNLV, hell even GaTech whose programs were all worse off than Memphis but have somehow been competitive and signed good recruiting classes.

GP is a lot of things, but lazy is not one of them. He has been "crapping" on Tubby because Tubby has run off 3 Top 100 players, demoted a coach that has more Top 20 players in his immediate family than Tubby has signed in the last decade. That's fine if you want to "do it your way", but when you run off "problem" talent, you better replace it with something. You and your staff better be working your ass off to land Top 30 recruiting classes considering the resources at your disposal. This staff was beaten out on the recruiting trail by Ouchita Baptist for heavens sake!! I don't know what's worse, the fact that our staff actually offered a kid who's only other offers were D-3, or that we LOST A RECRUITING BATTLE TO OUCHITA BAPTIST.

The real question is who in the hell thought this would be a good hire to begin with? 65 years old, had won 1 NCAAT game in a decade, who's average recruiting class was ranked in the 60s-70s and we wonder why we have the results we have. You didn't have to be Nostradamus to know how this was going to turn out.

(12-14-2017 03:56 PM)bariggins98 Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 01:00 PM)72Tiger Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 12:27 PM)salukiblue Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 12:07 PM)72Tiger Wrote:  Parrish like stirring the pot. Much easier role than actually researching and writing a well thought out article.

Did you even listen?

Here's a part of the transcript. It isn't perfectly translated, so it's not precise word for word correct.

It sounds VERY well researched and thought out.

Seth laid out a lot of the things that we have laid out on this show. About misses in recruiting. The transfers. The tigers' loss at the end of last season. How the roster is well below any normal Memphis historical standard. Attendance is well below any normal Memphis historical standard, in fact the Memphis attendance inside FedEx Forum is at an all time low. A modern era low. The lowest of my lifetime and projects to finish that way. As well it's just it's all bad stuff. And I'm not even saying that enthusiastically.

Or I know because it's just all bad stuff. I'm sick. When Josh Pastner was nudged out the door to go to Georgia Tech, things were obviously not good in a variety of ways. Recruiting had dropped off transfers had picked, up the winning had slipped. Back to back misses for the NCAA tournament, none of that is is untrue. But we talked about it at the time. I was on record saying Josh Pastner and Memphis need to divorce. I thought that they were probably gonna have to be like a couple that stays married just because neither one of them can afford to be divorced. But then Georgia Tech's swooped in and Memphis lowered the buyout and was able to nudge Josh Pastner out the door.

Things were bad in that moment. That was a good day for the University of Memphis and a good day for Josh Pastner, I thought. That's all true. This is also true... in every way you measure a basketball program things have gotten worse since then: attendance, recruiting, season ticket sales, rankings-- everything. You know Josh Pastner's worst kenpom ranking ever was 90th. Tubby Smith's first team finished outside the top 100. Right now they're 152. In every way you measure a basketball program, the Memphis program has gotten incredibly worse in every department without exception since Tubby Smith took over.

This isn't even an argument anymore. I don't even understand how anybody could put up a counter argument to it. I can bring you all the numbers, all the facts. You can't argue against facts. At this point if you're arguing against anything that I'm saying you're either just stubborn to a fault, interested in just being different because you like to be different, or too dumb to understand the argument. You pick. It doesn't matter to me. I'll let you pick which of the three.

And what Seth was able to do is share that with a national audience, which is something frankly I had not done. I could've written this Memphis basketball column at any point. I don't have much interest in writing that for CBS sports now. I figure we'll get to a day where I will write it. And it'll have whatever impact it has. I sometimes people say oh you're gonna write another bad Memphis column I've written one that negative Tubby Smith column in my entire life or I should rephrase it I think I might have written one back when he was at Kentucky, but since Tubby Smith has been the head coach of the University of Memphis I've written one negative Tubby Smith--that's the truth-- and it was after the Lawson's left and they were losing all of the transfers and replacing them with sub 150 prospects. And junior college players.

The reason I wrote that column then is because I knew what this was gonna look like in November/December. I'm not a psychic, I'm just also not an idiot. So while some people were trying to spin it into "you know the Lawson's were a cancer and we'll be better off without them and you don't know how good the JUCO players will be". I consistently said you don't know what you're talking about. Here's what's coming and now here we are. And so, the only people pushing back now fall in the one of those categories" too stubborn to a fault, interested in being different for the sake of being different, or too dumb to understand the argument. Too dumb to understand context.

Anybody with a brain who understands the sport of college basketball looks at what's happening with the Memphis basketball program and reaches the same conclusion I reached the same conclusions that Seth Davis wrote. And detailed in that column this morning. There's no other way to interpret it. And yet there are still a few who will jump on Facebook or on Twitter and and there was one young guy on Facebook earlier today, after I posted that davis' column, and he said "Yo they beat Albany last night. They're 7-2 now. So what is the problem?" And the point I've made to him is yeah they're 7-2 but what does it mean?

Georgetown undefeated right now what does it me right now? Nothing. Doesn't meaning anything. When you are high major program with incredible resources who plays these types of buy games now you can make your record whatever you wanna make your record until conference play starts, then you've got to play who the league tells you to play. (Brad) "I watched Mississippi State get blown out by Cincinnati last last night." Another good example. Now Mississippi State has put together a nice record--they were undefeated. I had State fans tweeting me "why isn't state ranked? Because they had not done anything. But they've beaten nobody. Those wins don't mean anything. State might might prove to be a good team but don't let it undefeated record until yesterday make you think it's a good thing then they go play a real team for the first time in and they get handled pretty easily.

Memphis is the exact same situation right now it is true they beat Albany last night. Then I got a message last night--"what are you gonna say about this?" Good, okay I think? I guess I would say beating Albany is better than losing to Albany, so like congratulations. But. Wow if we got to a point where we're Memphis fans are celebrating--if we get to the point at this point you take any win you can take, I'm not trying to pretend otherwise. But if we reached the point wirh Memphis basketball where you're celebrating victories over America east schools and not even like the best American schools. Like you you're proving my points. You're proving my point. The issue with the last night isn't that Memphis beat Albany or that Memphis could've lost Albany. Whatever the result, whatever the result is a forty minute basketball game. The issue if you wanna get right to a core of it is that Memphis basketball was only a one point favorite over Albany. Inside FedEx Forum. That should never happen. Your program should never get to a place where all the metrics and Las Vegas oddsmakers say the University of Memphis is only a one point favorite or two point favorite over Albany. Inside FedEx Forum. Once that point spread is placed on that game that tells you all you need to know about the where the university of Memphis basketball program is right now.

It's what I've been saying for months is what's Davis wrote this morning. But 7-2. Some people are happy with it. Here's what I would tell you about that 7-2 record. The seven wins have come against Little Rock, New Orleans, northern Kentucky, Mercer, Samford, Bryant, and Albany. And four of those seven teams or I should take three of the seven teams were literally missing their best player. If you combine those teams--the seven teams that Memphis has beaten, you get an average kenpom ranking of 205.6. That's what the seven wins have come against. Against teams that have an average kenpom ranking of 205.6.

The seven teams that Memphis has beaten again--Little Rock, New Orleans, northern Kentucky, Mercer, Samford, Bryant, and Albany have so far combined to play eleven different top 100 kenpom teams. You wanna guess what the record is against those top 100 Kempom teams? They played eleven games and you wanna guess what the record is? Eleven games now. 0-11. They've played eleven top 100 kenpom teams--the teams that Memphis has beaten and they've lost every single time. So that's the context of the seven and two record it doesn't mean anything.

It's not even good relative to the very low preseason expectations. Ready for this--here's proof. In the preseason they were ranked at 132nd at kenpom. The University of Memphis Tigers were. 132, which by the way should never be the case of the University of Memphis. Josh Pastners lowest point wasn't anywhere close to 132 at kenpom. The low point where you wanted Josh Pastner fired and were willing to insist that the university should pay ten million dollars to make it happen. They were never close to 132 at kenpom, but that's where they were in the preseason this season. You know they are now after nine games? 151/152.

They've actually performed at a level below what they were expected to perform even relative to the preseason expectations that were already low. They are 3-4 against the spread. They've dropped thirty places in kenpom even with the wins, even by going 7-2. So there's no way to look at this information intelligently and try to spin it into something positive. That's a dumb man's game. I don't mind if you wanna be dumb. Just don't ever expect me to be dumb with you. You can be dumb if you want to and celebrate wins over Albany and try to pretend that the 7-2 record mean something. You can be dumb about it if you want to, just do it got ask me to be dumb with you. I'm not interested in that.

Now the good news is that on Saturday if you want to prove your a real team, you've got an opportunity. On a neutral court against a real opponent. I don't think louisville as good as it was supposed to be. A lot of that have to do with their highest rated freshman was ruled ineligible. And they replaced one of the greatest coaches of all time with a 32 year old first year head coach--you know like that matters. And so I don't think Louisville is a legitimate top ten team or top twenty or right now probably top 25 team. Louisville is still good, they've got good players. So if you think this is a formula that the University of Memphis is using, this is formula to be competitive at the level at which Memphis basketball is supposed to be competitive, at the level at which your program that pays the coach three million dollars a year is supposed to be competitive. Well, Saturday your opportunity to prove it. To be clear if they beat Louisville on Saturday. I will think it says more about Louisville than it says about Memphis. It won't make me change my big views about the Memphis basketball program. But at least you'll be able to say "don't say we can't beat anybody with this roster right doing it this way, we just knocked out the Louisville cardinals in New York." The opportunity's on Saturday we'll throw the ball up and play for forty minutes.

Thanks for the transcription. Parrish doesn't like 'Tubby ball' if you want to call it that. No matter the results, he wouldn't like it. Not his style and not something that is easy to write articles about because Tubby is not a media friendly coach.

I like 'Tubby ball'. By Tubby ball I mean the four year guys built up over time. I don't care too much about the big splash recruiting drama, don't follow any of that on twitter, look at rankings, etc.

That said, there are plenty of coaches who play 'Tubby ball'. We could have hired a better one IMO. We have Tubby tho, and I'd love for it to work. I'm a long term thinker by nature. I know I'm in the minority, and I'm not trying to change opinions.

Parrish is crapping all over Tubby. Been doing it -by his own admission - even before this season started. I don't care for it. It's lazy IMO. Write an article about the strengths and weaknesses of the team maybe? Or just throw a bunch of gas on the fire when it's good and hot and there are lots of eager faces looking to see how big the flames can get.

Final point - When we fire Tubby and go with a guy more like what everyone wants, I'll get on board with that. I just like this way better. It suits my style.

True, there are numerous coaches, some with less experience than Tubby, that are winning at NCAAT with 3 and 4 year guys and without the 5* splash ala, Kentucky, Duke, Kansas. GP actually named coaches who have a reputation of recruiting the "right way" that still land solid 3 and 4*s. He specifically mentioned Michigan, Wisconsin, UVA yesterday. There are also schools that hired new coaches the exact same time as Memphis hired Tubby. He's mentioned the recruiting wins by the staffs at Vandy, TCU, UNLV, hell even GaTech whose programs were all worse off than Memphis but have somehow been competitive and signed good recruiting classes.

GP is a lot of things, but lazy is not one of them. He has been "crapping" on Tubby because Tubby has run off 3 Top 100 players, demoted a coach that has more Top 20 players in his immediate family than Tubby has signed in the last decade. That's fine if you want to "do it your way", but when you run off "problem" talent, you better replace it with something. You and your staff better be working your ass off to land Top 30 recruiting classes considering the resources at your disposal. This staff was beaten out on the recruiting trail by Ouchita Baptist for heavens sake!! I don't know what's worse, the fact that our staff actually offered a kid who's only other offers were D-3, or that we LOST A RECRUITING BATTLE TO OUCHITA BAPTIST.

The real question is who in the hell thought this would be a good hire to begin with? 65 years old, had won 1 NCAAT game in a decade, who's average recruiting class was ranked in the 60s-70s and we wonder why we have the results we have. You didn't have to be Nostradamus to know how this was going to turn out.

Parrish worked hard on this? Look, it’s plain to anyone remotely associated with the program that we are in decline. Have been for years. Pastner poisoned the well locally. Memphis kids don’t want to come here anymore. Word gets out. Look at his transfers. He signs the Lawson’s because they hired their dad. They would have went elsewhere if he didn’t pay daddy.

Tubby has done nothing to improve this. Kids still don’t want to come here. No one cares about the good years (Calipari).

You mention the Matt Stanley deal. I’m not sure if he was offered, but my guess is that he was. Regardless, the kid totally backed off once he became torched publicly. Commercial appeal article, talk radio. Why would he come here after that? Add that to the fact that Memphis most likely pulled their offer.

I could care less about the Lawson’s. Those guys enjoyed sticking it to Tubby and the program. Blamed his son giving us the middle finger on fans calling him a (inset N word) during games. How about Dedric punching some dude in the face at Kansas? KJ’s classy recording? Dedric running out on his Bar Louie tab (which turned out to be a misunderstanding, lol). This family is a piece of work and I’m glad to see them gone. If they were here, what would they be trying to extort out of the university now?

Tubby has had his share of failures, but getting rid of these losers isn’t one of them.

He may be a hard worker, hell I don't know him, but pouring gas on a fire is not hard work. That's what this seemed like to me.

(12-14-2017 03:48 PM)Smith Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 03:08 PM)Stammers Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 03:05 PM)salukiblue Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 01:37 PM)memtiger1987 Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 01:12 PM)salukiblue Wrote:  You're welcome.

My only counter to you're liking Tubby Ball is that Tubby isn't doing Tubby ball.

Instead of LOADING up on frosh this past 2017 class (and maybe a traditional sit-a-year transfer) he went the 2-yr player route. I would have cut him a lot more slack had he just done that instead.

That is the antithesis of "building" a team with four year players.

He could have added a bunch in 2016, too. There are always kids out there in April/May that could become decent 4-year players. Hell, we had 5 open schollies last year.

Memphis will likely have huge turnover in 2019--losing at least six guys, which will require a hard reset. Is that when "Tubbyball" will actually commence? If so, that means his plan won't come to fruition until year six, even though he's only under contract for 5 years.

Please tell me about all of these top freshmen that were available after the team imploded? Not alot left in April, and those that are have dozens of offers from high end programs.

Some of your other criticisms are valid, but I think he did a great job fielding a team after things blew up. I think Tubby should have shown this same energy after he was hired, a couple of Davenport type guys could have added depth to that team.

Telly me where is wanted "top freshmen?"

In fact, you are just trying to pick a nit, because in my "want" above all I looked for was "decent 4-year players."

And that brings me to just one more critique of this staff: they don't work 24/7.

At Tech, they only had two spots open for 2016, Clergeot and some JUCO guy filled the spots in the early period. Apparently, at that point, Tubby and staff dusted their hands off and took the rest of the year off from recruiting. Because when they came to Memphis, they had absolutely no recruits go after besides the one they stole from their old school.

The same problem this year. They get the three in the early period, get in on a couple JUCO's but then have no other connections and leads for frosh once 65% of the team suddenly leaves. They should never have that issue.

I'm sure there was a Vanover type (300+ recruit) available in 2016. Hell, I'm sure we can look at Hoopdreams old recruiting thread where he did more work than the staff to bring up names of available players.

And Tubby absolutely did go on a two week vacation when he got the job; NOT to be confused with the 2 year vacation he has been on. He actually went on vacation with the clock ticking big time and scholarships galore available.

Quote:He was somewhat under the radar shortly after taking the job, he said, to honor a vacation commitment he’d had been postponing for several years. When he returned, it was back to restoring a roster that had only seven scholarship players.

What kind of a coach or a human being who is hired at twice his salary, with barely enough players to field a team, in good conscience takes a two week vacation? This, hiring Saul and his famous "Memphis isn't what it used to be 10 years ago" comment should have told anyone who had a doubt what kind of a lazy has been Tubby is.

None of that would have mattered, if he had not been blindsided by the Lawsons. They should have stayed and showed some loyalty to Tubby and the city. Their exit was planned to cause maximum damage to the program. Same as when Austin Nichols left in the middle of the summer after the recruiting season was over. That is why you only recruit role players from Memphis.

Blindsided? Anyone with even a little bit of common sense knew what was happening. Jason Smith said it numerous times and the Tub actually called him a "bald face liar".

(12-14-2017 04:35 PM)memtigbb Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 03:48 PM)Smith Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 03:08 PM)Stammers Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 03:05 PM)salukiblue Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 01:37 PM)memtiger1987 Wrote:  
Please tell me about all of these top freshmen that were available after the team imploded? Not alot left in April, and those that are have dozens of offers from high end programs.

Some of your other criticisms are valid, but I think he did a great job fielding a team after things blew up. I think Tubby should have shown this same energy after he was hired, a couple of Davenport type guys could have added depth to that team.

Telly me where is wanted "top freshmen?"

In fact, you are just trying to pick a nit, because in my "want" above all I looked for was "decent 4-year players."

And that brings me to just one more critique of this staff: they don't work 24/7.

At Tech, they only had two spots open for 2016, Clergeot and some JUCO guy filled the spots in the early period. Apparently, at that point, Tubby and staff dusted their hands off and took the rest of the year off from recruiting. Because when they came to Memphis, they had absolutely no recruits go after besides the one they stole from their old school.

The same problem this year. They get the three in the early period, get in on a couple JUCO's but then have no other connections and leads for frosh once 65% of the team suddenly leaves. They should never have that issue.

I'm sure there was a Vanover type (300+ recruit) available in 2016. Hell, I'm sure we can look at Hoopdreams old recruiting thread where he did more work than the staff to bring up names of available players.

And Tubby absolutely did go on a two week vacation when he got the job; NOT to be confused with the 2 year vacation he has been on. He actually went on vacation with the clock ticking big time and scholarships galore available.

Quote:He was somewhat under the radar shortly after taking the job, he said, to honor a vacation commitment he’d had been postponing for several years. When he returned, it was back to restoring a roster that had only seven scholarship players.

What kind of a coach or a human being who is hired at twice his salary, with barely enough players to field a team, in good conscience takes a two week vacation? This, hiring Saul and his famous "Memphis isn't what it used to be 10 years ago" comment should have told anyone who had a doubt what kind of a lazy has been Tubby is.

None of that would have mattered, if he had not been blindsided by the Lawsons. They should have stayed and showed some loyalty to Tubby and the city. Their exit was planned to cause maximum damage to the program. Same as when Austin Nichols left in the middle of the summer after the recruiting season was over. That is why you only recruit role players from Memphis.

Blindsided? Anyone with even a little bit of common sense knew what was happening. Jason Smith said it numerous times and the Tub actually called him a "bald face liar".

There was always the chance Dedric was going to leave. There were likely at least six spots available.

Blindsided would be Clergeot leaving when a week earlier Tubby proclaimed Keon (and not Jeremiah) as "his kind of player." Craig Randall's transfer should have been seen, same for contingencies in case Markel sought to do a grad transfer.

That is called staying ahead of the curve. Considering I get $0 to do this and was aware of those issues in the winter and Tubby gets $3,000,000 a year to do this, he doesn't get any slack from me.

(12-14-2017 04:26 PM)memtiger1987 Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 03:56 PM)bariggins98 Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 01:00 PM)72Tiger Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 12:27 PM)salukiblue Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 12:07 PM)72Tiger Wrote:  Parrish like stirring the pot. Much easier role than actually researching and writing a well thought out article.

Did you even listen?

Here's a part of the transcript. It isn't perfectly translated, so it's not precise word for word correct.

It sounds VERY well researched and thought out.

Seth laid out a lot of the things that we have laid out on this show. About misses in recruiting. The transfers. The tigers' loss at the end of last season. How the roster is well below any normal Memphis historical standard. Attendance is well below any normal Memphis historical standard, in fact the Memphis attendance inside FedEx Forum is at an all time low. A modern era low. The lowest of my lifetime and projects to finish that way. As well it's just it's all bad stuff. And I'm not even saying that enthusiastically.

Or I know because it's just all bad stuff. I'm sick. When Josh Pastner was nudged out the door to go to Georgia Tech, things were obviously not good in a variety of ways. Recruiting had dropped off transfers had picked, up the winning had slipped. Back to back misses for the NCAA tournament, none of that is is untrue. But we talked about it at the time. I was on record saying Josh Pastner and Memphis need to divorce. I thought that they were probably gonna have to be like a couple that stays married just because neither one of them can afford to be divorced. But then Georgia Tech's swooped in and Memphis lowered the buyout and was able to nudge Josh Pastner out the door.

Things were bad in that moment. That was a good day for the University of Memphis and a good day for Josh Pastner, I thought. That's all true. This is also true... in every way you measure a basketball program things have gotten worse since then: attendance, recruiting, season ticket sales, rankings-- everything. You know Josh Pastner's worst kenpom ranking ever was 90th. Tubby Smith's first team finished outside the top 100. Right now they're 152. In every way you measure a basketball program, the Memphis program has gotten incredibly worse in every department without exception since Tubby Smith took over.

This isn't even an argument anymore. I don't even understand how anybody could put up a counter argument to it. I can bring you all the numbers, all the facts. You can't argue against facts. At this point if you're arguing against anything that I'm saying you're either just stubborn to a fault, interested in just being different because you like to be different, or too dumb to understand the argument. You pick. It doesn't matter to me. I'll let you pick which of the three.

And what Seth was able to do is share that with a national audience, which is something frankly I had not done. I could've written this Memphis basketball column at any point. I don't have much interest in writing that for CBS sports now. I figure we'll get to a day where I will write it. And it'll have whatever impact it has. I sometimes people say oh you're gonna write another bad Memphis column I've written one that negative Tubby Smith column in my entire life or I should rephrase it I think I might have written one back when he was at Kentucky, but since Tubby Smith has been the head coach of the University of Memphis I've written one negative Tubby Smith--that's the truth-- and it was after the Lawson's left and they were losing all of the transfers and replacing them with sub 150 prospects. And junior college players.

The reason I wrote that column then is because I knew what this was gonna look like in November/December. I'm not a psychic, I'm just also not an idiot. So while some people were trying to spin it into "you know the Lawson's were a cancer and we'll be better off without them and you don't know how good the JUCO players will be". I consistently said you don't know what you're talking about. Here's what's coming and now here we are. And so, the only people pushing back now fall in the one of those categories" too stubborn to a fault, interested in being different for the sake of being different, or too dumb to understand the argument. Too dumb to understand context.

Anybody with a brain who understands the sport of college basketball looks at what's happening with the Memphis basketball program and reaches the same conclusion I reached the same conclusions that Seth Davis wrote. And detailed in that column this morning. There's no other way to interpret it. And yet there are still a few who will jump on Facebook or on Twitter and and there was one young guy on Facebook earlier today, after I posted that davis' column, and he said "Yo they beat Albany last night. They're 7-2 now. So what is the problem?" And the point I've made to him is yeah they're 7-2 but what does it mean?

Georgetown undefeated right now what does it me right now? Nothing. Doesn't meaning anything. When you are high major program with incredible resources who plays these types of buy games now you can make your record whatever you wanna make your record until conference play starts, then you've got to play who the league tells you to play. (Brad) "I watched Mississippi State get blown out by Cincinnati last last night." Another good example. Now Mississippi State has put together a nice record--they were undefeated. I had State fans tweeting me "why isn't state ranked? Because they had not done anything. But they've beaten nobody. Those wins don't mean anything. State might might prove to be a good team but don't let it undefeated record until yesterday make you think it's a good thing then they go play a real team for the first time in and they get handled pretty easily.

Memphis is the exact same situation right now it is true they beat Albany last night. Then I got a message last night--"what are you gonna say about this?" Good, okay I think? I guess I would say beating Albany is better than losing to Albany, so like congratulations. But. Wow if we got to a point where we're Memphis fans are celebrating--if we get to the point at this point you take any win you can take, I'm not trying to pretend otherwise. But if we reached the point wirh Memphis basketball where you're celebrating victories over America east schools and not even like the best American schools. Like you you're proving my points. You're proving my point. The issue with the last night isn't that Memphis beat Albany or that Memphis could've lost Albany. Whatever the result, whatever the result is a forty minute basketball game. The issue if you wanna get right to a core of it is that Memphis basketball was only a one point favorite over Albany. Inside FedEx Forum. That should never happen. Your program should never get to a place where all the metrics and Las Vegas oddsmakers say the University of Memphis is only a one point favorite or two point favorite over Albany. Inside FedEx Forum. Once that point spread is placed on that game that tells you all you need to know about the where the university of Memphis basketball program is right now.

It's what I've been saying for months is what's Davis wrote this morning. But 7-2. Some people are happy with it. Here's what I would tell you about that 7-2 record. The seven wins have come against Little Rock, New Orleans, northern Kentucky, Mercer, Samford, Bryant, and Albany. And four of those seven teams or I should take three of the seven teams were literally missing their best player. If you combine those teams--the seven teams that Memphis has beaten, you get an average kenpom ranking of 205.6. That's what the seven wins have come against. Against teams that have an average kenpom ranking of 205.6.

The seven teams that Memphis has beaten again--Little Rock, New Orleans, northern Kentucky, Mercer, Samford, Bryant, and Albany have so far combined to play eleven different top 100 kenpom teams. You wanna guess what the record is against those top 100 Kempom teams? They played eleven games and you wanna guess what the record is? Eleven games now. 0-11. They've played eleven top 100 kenpom teams--the teams that Memphis has beaten and they've lost every single time. So that's the context of the seven and two record it doesn't mean anything.

It's not even good relative to the very low preseason expectations. Ready for this--here's proof. In the preseason they were ranked at 132nd at kenpom. The University of Memphis Tigers were. 132, which by the way should never be the case of the University of Memphis. Josh Pastners lowest point wasn't anywhere close to 132 at kenpom. The low point where you wanted Josh Pastner fired and were willing to insist that the university should pay ten million dollars to make it happen. They were never close to 132 at kenpom, but that's where they were in the preseason this season. You know they are now after nine games? 151/152.

They've actually performed at a level below what they were expected to perform even relative to the preseason expectations that were already low. They are 3-4 against the spread. They've dropped thirty places in kenpom even with the wins, even by going 7-2. So there's no way to look at this information intelligently and try to spin it into something positive. That's a dumb man's game. I don't mind if you wanna be dumb. Just don't ever expect me to be dumb with you. You can be dumb if you want to and celebrate wins over Albany and try to pretend that the 7-2 record mean something. You can be dumb about it if you want to, just do it got ask me to be dumb with you. I'm not interested in that.

Now the good news is that on Saturday if you want to prove your a real team, you've got an opportunity. On a neutral court against a real opponent. I don't think louisville as good as it was supposed to be. A lot of that have to do with their highest rated freshman was ruled ineligible. And they replaced one of the greatest coaches of all time with a 32 year old first year head coach--you know like that matters. And so I don't think Louisville is a legitimate top ten team or top twenty or right now probably top 25 team. Louisville is still good, they've got good players. So if you think this is a formula that the University of Memphis is using, this is formula to be competitive at the level at which Memphis basketball is supposed to be competitive, at the level at which your program that pays the coach three million dollars a year is supposed to be competitive. Well, Saturday your opportunity to prove it. To be clear if they beat Louisville on Saturday. I will think it says more about Louisville than it says about Memphis. It won't make me change my big views about the Memphis basketball program. But at least you'll be able to say "don't say we can't beat anybody with this roster right doing it this way, we just knocked out the Louisville cardinals in New York." The opportunity's on Saturday we'll throw the ball up and play for forty minutes.

Thanks for the transcription. Parrish doesn't like 'Tubby ball' if you want to call it that. No matter the results, he wouldn't like it. Not his style and not something that is easy to write articles about because Tubby is not a media friendly coach.

I like 'Tubby ball'. By Tubby ball I mean the four year guys built up over time. I don't care too much about the big splash recruiting drama, don't follow any of that on twitter, look at rankings, etc.

That said, there are plenty of coaches who play 'Tubby ball'. We could have hired a better one IMO. We have Tubby tho, and I'd love for it to work. I'm a long term thinker by nature. I know I'm in the minority, and I'm not trying to change opinions.

Parrish is crapping all over Tubby. Been doing it -by his own admission - even before this season started. I don't care for it. It's lazy IMO. Write an article about the strengths and weaknesses of the team maybe? Or just throw a bunch of gas on the fire when it's good and hot and there are lots of eager faces looking to see how big the flames can get.

Final point - When we fire Tubby and go with a guy more like what everyone wants, I'll get on board with that. I just like this way better. It suits my style.

True, there are numerous coaches, some with less experience than Tubby, that are winning at NCAAT with 3 and 4 year guys and without the 5* splash ala, Kentucky, Duke, Kansas. GP actually named coaches who have a reputation of recruiting the "right way" that still land solid 3 and 4*s. He specifically mentioned Michigan, Wisconsin, UVA yesterday. There are also schools that hired new coaches the exact same time as Memphis hired Tubby. He's mentioned the recruiting wins by the staffs at Vandy, TCU, UNLV, hell even GaTech whose programs were all worse off than Memphis but have somehow been competitive and signed good recruiting classes.

GP is a lot of things, but lazy is not one of them. He has been "crapping" on Tubby because Tubby has run off 3 Top 100 players, demoted a coach that has more Top 20 players in his immediate family than Tubby has signed in the last decade. That's fine if you want to "do it your way", but when you run off "problem" talent, you better replace it with something. You and your staff better be working your ass off to land Top 30 recruiting classes considering the resources at your disposal. This staff was beaten out on the recruiting trail by Ouchita Baptist for heavens sake!! I don't know what's worse, the fact that our staff actually offered a kid who's only other offers were D-3, or that we LOST A RECRUITING BATTLE TO OUCHITA BAPTIST.

The real question is who in the hell thought this would be a good hire to begin with? 65 years old, had won 1 NCAAT game in a decade, who's average recruiting class was ranked in the 60s-70s and we wonder why we have the results we have. You didn't have to be Nostradamus to know how this was going to turn out.

Parrish worked hard on this? Look, it’s plain to anyone remotely associated with the program that we are in decline. Have been for years. Pastner poisoned the well locally. Memphis kids don’t want to come here anymore. Word gets out. Look at his transfers. He signs the Lawson’s because they hired their dad. They would have went elsewhere if he didn’t pay daddy.

Tubby has done nothing to improve this. Kids still don’t want to come here. No one cares about the good years (Calipari).

You mention the Matt Stanley deal. I’m not sure if he was offered, but my guess is that he was. Regardless, the kid totally backed off once he became torched publicly. Commercial appeal article, talk radio. Why would he come here after that? Add that to the fact that Memphis most likely pulled their offer.

I could care less about the Lawson’s. Those guys enjoyed sticking it to Tubby and the program. Blamed his son giving us the middle finger on fans calling him a (inset N word) during games. How about Dedric punching some dude in the face at Kansas? KJ’s classy recording? Dedric running out on his Bar Louie tab (which turned out to be a misunderstanding, lol). This family is a piece of work and I’m glad to see them gone. If they were here, what would they be trying to extort out of the university now?

Tubby has had his share of failures, but getting rid of these losers isn’t one of them.

The Lawsons "stuck it to Tubby" because he demoted their State Championship winning coach and father to hire his dead weight son. I don't think it is extortion to expect the job you were promised. Again, Keelon has more Top 30 players in his immediate family than Tubby has landed in a decade.

Hiring relatives/AAU coaches/high school coaches/play cousins is not against NCAA rules and this happens all the time. Ever hear of Ronnie and Mario Chalmers?? Interesting that Ronnie resigned his position on the Kansas staff 4 months after Mario hit his famous shot in San Antonio.

Question, where does cheating on a National College Entrance exam, making it rain at the Plush Club, inciting a riot on Beale Street, hitting girl friends/baby momma's, Faux Fur Coat Gate, soliciting prostitutes, and theft of Goldsmith's gift cards rank in your morality barometer vs flipping the bird and walking on a bar tab? Do you harbor this much hate for Derrick Rose, Joey Dorsey, Jeremy Hunt, Robert Dozier, Clyde Wade, and Andre Allen as the Lawsons?

Harsh but fair.

(12-14-2017 12:33 PM)450bench Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 10:56 AM)herkermer Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 10:43 AM)mairving Wrote:  Basically just said that he could have written the column and he's been saying the same stuff all year.

Yep. Typical me me me I I I GP bit... He is a shameless self promoter. Cant argue with the results, he has huge ratings. Cant argue with the fact that hes a pompous, arrogant little know it all doosh either. I also agree with his assessment... sadly.

Yep. For me, he's simply someone I just can't listen to.

He called me out by name on his show... called me an idiot. Basically he said “no one” would be at memphis madness, and that the building would be “mostly empty”. When we had what I thought was a decent turnout, i called him out on his FB page. He said “by definition anything less than 9000 in an 18000 seat arena is “mostly empty”. He went on a rant on his show and i was the idiot.
Guess i showed him... maybe had something to do with me calling him a “little liberal leprechaun”.

(12-14-2017 04:31 PM)72Tiger Wrote:  He may be a hard worker, hell I don't know him, but pouring gas on a fire is not hard work. That's what this seemed like to me.

Have you bothered to read the transcript yet or are you still just running your mouth?

(12-14-2017 05:54 PM)herkermer Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 12:33 PM)450bench Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 10:56 AM)herkermer Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 10:43 AM)mairving Wrote:  Basically just said that he could have written the column and he's been saying the same stuff all year.

Yep. Typical me me me I I I GP bit... He is a shameless self promoter. Cant argue with the results, he has huge ratings. Cant argue with the fact that hes a pompous, arrogant little know it all doosh either. I also agree with his assessment... sadly.

Yep. For me, he's simply someone I just can't listen to.

He called me out by name on his show... called me an idiot. Basically he said “no one” would be at memphis madness, and that the building would be “mostly empty”. When we had what I thought was a decent turnout, i called him out on his FB page. He said “by definition anything less than 9000 in an 18000 seat arena is “mostly empty”. He went on a rant on his show and i was the idiot.
Guess i showed him... maybe had something to do with me calling him a “little liberal leprechaun”.

+3

I'm really starting to think we have several "too dumb to understand context" posters in this thread.........

(12-14-2017 05:47 PM)bariggins98 Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 04:26 PM)memtiger1987 Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 03:56 PM)bariggins98 Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 01:00 PM)72Tiger Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 12:27 PM)salukiblue Wrote:  Did you even listen?

Here's a part of the transcript. It isn't perfectly translated, so it's not precise word for word correct.

It sounds VERY well researched and thought out.

Seth laid out a lot of the things that we have laid out on this show. About misses in recruiting. The transfers. The tigers' loss at the end of last season. How the roster is well below any normal Memphis historical standard. Attendance is well below any normal Memphis historical standard, in fact the Memphis attendance inside FedEx Forum is at an all time low. A modern era low. The lowest of my lifetime and projects to finish that way. As well it's just it's all bad stuff. And I'm not even saying that enthusiastically.

Or I know because it's just all bad stuff. I'm sick. When Josh Pastner was nudged out the door to go to Georgia Tech, things were obviously not good in a variety of ways. Recruiting had dropped off transfers had picked, up the winning had slipped. Back to back misses for the NCAA tournament, none of that is is untrue. But we talked about it at the time. I was on record saying Josh Pastner and Memphis need to divorce. I thought that they were probably gonna have to be like a couple that stays married just because neither one of them can afford to be divorced. But then Georgia Tech's swooped in and Memphis lowered the buyout and was able to nudge Josh Pastner out the door.

Things were bad in that moment. That was a good day for the University of Memphis and a good day for Josh Pastner, I thought. That's all true. This is also true... in every way you measure a basketball program things have gotten worse since then: attendance, recruiting, season ticket sales, rankings-- everything. You know Josh Pastner's worst kenpom ranking ever was 90th. Tubby Smith's first team finished outside the top 100. Right now they're 152. In every way you measure a basketball program, the Memphis program has gotten incredibly worse in every department without exception since Tubby Smith took over.

This isn't even an argument anymore. I don't even understand how anybody could put up a counter argument to it. I can bring you all the numbers, all the facts. You can't argue against facts. At this point if you're arguing against anything that I'm saying you're either just stubborn to a fault, interested in just being different because you like to be different, or too dumb to understand the argument. You pick. It doesn't matter to me. I'll let you pick which of the three.

And what Seth was able to do is share that with a national audience, which is something frankly I had not done. I could've written this Memphis basketball column at any point. I don't have much interest in writing that for CBS sports now. I figure we'll get to a day where I will write it. And it'll have whatever impact it has. I sometimes people say oh you're gonna write another bad Memphis column I've written one that negative Tubby Smith column in my entire life or I should rephrase it I think I might have written one back when he was at Kentucky, but since Tubby Smith has been the head coach of the University of Memphis I've written one negative Tubby Smith--that's the truth-- and it was after the Lawson's left and they were losing all of the transfers and replacing them with sub 150 prospects. And junior college players.

The reason I wrote that column then is because I knew what this was gonna look like in November/December. I'm not a psychic, I'm just also not an idiot. So while some people were trying to spin it into "you know the Lawson's were a cancer and we'll be better off without them and you don't know how good the JUCO players will be". I consistently said you don't know what you're talking about. Here's what's coming and now here we are. And so, the only people pushing back now fall in the one of those categories" too stubborn to a fault, interested in being different for the sake of being different, or too dumb to understand the argument. Too dumb to understand context.

Anybody with a brain who understands the sport of college basketball looks at what's happening with the Memphis basketball program and reaches the same conclusion I reached the same conclusions that Seth Davis wrote. And detailed in that column this morning. There's no other way to interpret it. And yet there are still a few who will jump on Facebook or on Twitter and and there was one young guy on Facebook earlier today, after I posted that davis' column, and he said "Yo they beat Albany last night. They're 7-2 now. So what is the problem?" And the point I've made to him is yeah they're 7-2 but what does it mean?

Georgetown undefeated right now what does it me right now? Nothing. Doesn't meaning anything. When you are high major program with incredible resources who plays these types of buy games now you can make your record whatever you wanna make your record until conference play starts, then you've got to play who the league tells you to play. (Brad) "I watched Mississippi State get blown out by Cincinnati last last night." Another good example. Now Mississippi State has put together a nice record--they were undefeated. I had State fans tweeting me "why isn't state ranked? Because they had not done anything. But they've beaten nobody. Those wins don't mean anything. State might might prove to be a good team but don't let it undefeated record until yesterday make you think it's a good thing then they go play a real team for the first time in and they get handled pretty easily.

Memphis is the exact same situation right now it is true they beat Albany last night. Then I got a message last night--"what are you gonna say about this?" Good, okay I think? I guess I would say beating Albany is better than losing to Albany, so like congratulations. But. Wow if we got to a point where we're Memphis fans are celebrating--if we get to the point at this point you take any win you can take, I'm not trying to pretend otherwise. But if we reached the point wirh Memphis basketball where you're celebrating victories over America east schools and not even like the best American schools. Like you you're proving my points. You're proving my point. The issue with the last night isn't that Memphis beat Albany or that Memphis could've lost Albany. Whatever the result, whatever the result is a forty minute basketball game. The issue if you wanna get right to a core of it is that Memphis basketball was only a one point favorite over Albany. Inside FedEx Forum. That should never happen. Your program should never get to a place where all the metrics and Las Vegas oddsmakers say the University of Memphis is only a one point favorite or two point favorite over Albany. Inside FedEx Forum. Once that point spread is placed on that game that tells you all you need to know about the where the university of Memphis basketball program is right now.

It's what I've been saying for months is what's Davis wrote this morning. But 7-2. Some people are happy with it. Here's what I would tell you about that 7-2 record. The seven wins have come against Little Rock, New Orleans, northern Kentucky, Mercer, Samford, Bryant, and Albany. And four of those seven teams or I should take three of the seven teams were literally missing their best player. If you combine those teams--the seven teams that Memphis has beaten, you get an average kenpom ranking of 205.6. That's what the seven wins have come against. Against teams that have an average kenpom ranking of 205.6.

The seven teams that Memphis has beaten again--Little Rock, New Orleans, northern Kentucky, Mercer, Samford, Bryant, and Albany have so far combined to play eleven different top 100 kenpom teams. You wanna guess what the record is against those top 100 Kempom teams? They played eleven games and you wanna guess what the record is? Eleven games now. 0-11. They've played eleven top 100 kenpom teams--the teams that Memphis has beaten and they've lost every single time. So that's the context of the seven and two record it doesn't mean anything.

It's not even good relative to the very low preseason expectations. Ready for this--here's proof. In the preseason they were ranked at 132nd at kenpom. The University of Memphis Tigers were. 132, which by the way should never be the case of the University of Memphis. Josh Pastners lowest point wasn't anywhere close to 132 at kenpom. The low point where you wanted Josh Pastner fired and were willing to insist that the university should pay ten million dollars to make it happen. They were never close to 132 at kenpom, but that's where they were in the preseason this season. You know they are now after nine games? 151/152.

They've actually performed at a level below what they were expected to perform even relative to the preseason expectations that were already low. They are 3-4 against the spread. They've dropped thirty places in kenpom even with the wins, even by going 7-2. So there's no way to look at this information intelligently and try to spin it into something positive. That's a dumb man's game. I don't mind if you wanna be dumb. Just don't ever expect me to be dumb with you. You can be dumb if you want to and celebrate wins over Albany and try to pretend that the 7-2 record mean something. You can be dumb about it if you want to, just do it got ask me to be dumb with you. I'm not interested in that.

Now the good news is that on Saturday if you want to prove your a real team, you've got an opportunity. On a neutral court against a real opponent. I don't think louisville as good as it was supposed to be. A lot of that have to do with their highest rated freshman was ruled ineligible. And they replaced one of the greatest coaches of all time with a 32 year old first year head coach--you know like that matters. And so I don't think Louisville is a legitimate top ten team or top twenty or right now probably top 25 team. Louisville is still good, they've got good players. So if you think this is a formula that the University of Memphis is using, this is formula to be competitive at the level at which Memphis basketball is supposed to be competitive, at the level at which your program that pays the coach three million dollars a year is supposed to be competitive. Well, Saturday your opportunity to prove it. To be clear if they beat Louisville on Saturday. I will think it says more about Louisville than it says about Memphis. It won't make me change my big views about the Memphis basketball program. But at least you'll be able to say "don't say we can't beat anybody with this roster right doing it this way, we just knocked out the Louisville cardinals in New York." The opportunity's on Saturday we'll throw the ball up and play for forty minutes.

Thanks for the transcription. Parrish doesn't like 'Tubby ball' if you want to call it that. No matter the results, he wouldn't like it. Not his style and not something that is easy to write articles about because Tubby is not a media friendly coach.

I like 'Tubby ball'. By Tubby ball I mean the four year guys built up over time. I don't care too much about the big splash recruiting drama, don't follow any of that on twitter, look at rankings, etc.

That said, there are plenty of coaches who play 'Tubby ball'. We could have hired a better one IMO. We have Tubby tho, and I'd love for it to work. I'm a long term thinker by nature. I know I'm in the minority, and I'm not trying to change opinions.

Parrish is crapping all over Tubby. Been doing it -by his own admission - even before this season started. I don't care for it. It's lazy IMO. Write an article about the strengths and weaknesses of the team maybe? Or just throw a bunch of gas on the fire when it's good and hot and there are lots of eager faces looking to see how big the flames can get.

Final point - When we fire Tubby and go with a guy more like what everyone wants, I'll get on board with that. I just like this way better. It suits my style.

True, there are numerous coaches, some with less experience than Tubby, that are winning at NCAAT with 3 and 4 year guys and without the 5* splash ala, Kentucky, Duke, Kansas. GP actually named coaches who have a reputation of recruiting the "right way" that still land solid 3 and 4*s. He specifically mentioned Michigan, Wisconsin, UVA yesterday. There are also schools that hired new coaches the exact same time as Memphis hired Tubby. He's mentioned the recruiting wins by the staffs at Vandy, TCU, UNLV, hell even GaTech whose programs were all worse off than Memphis but have somehow been competitive and signed good recruiting classes.

GP is a lot of things, but lazy is not one of them. He has been "crapping" on Tubby because Tubby has run off 3 Top 100 players, demoted a coach that has more Top 20 players in his immediate family than Tubby has signed in the last decade. That's fine if you want to "do it your way", but when you run off "problem" talent, you better replace it with something. You and your staff better be working your ass off to land Top 30 recruiting classes considering the resources at your disposal. This staff was beaten out on the recruiting trail by Ouchita Baptist for heavens sake!! I don't know what's worse, the fact that our staff actually offered a kid who's only other offers were D-3, or that we LOST A RECRUITING BATTLE TO OUCHITA BAPTIST.

The real question is who in the hell thought this would be a good hire to begin with? 65 years old, had won 1 NCAAT game in a decade, who's average recruiting class was ranked in the 60s-70s and we wonder why we have the results we have. You didn't have to be Nostradamus to know how this was going to turn out.

Parrish worked hard on this? Look, it’s plain to anyone remotely associated with the program that we are in decline. Have been for years. Pastner poisoned the well locally. Memphis kids don’t want to come here anymore. Word gets out. Look at his transfers. He signs the Lawson’s because they hired their dad. They would have went elsewhere if he didn’t pay daddy.

Tubby has done nothing to improve this. Kids still don’t want to come here. No one cares about the good years (Calipari).

You mention the Matt Stanley deal. I’m not sure if he was offered, but my guess is that he was. Regardless, the kid totally backed off once he became torched publicly. Commercial appeal article, talk radio. Why would he come here after that? Add that to the fact that Memphis most likely pulled their offer.

I could care less about the Lawson’s. Those guys enjoyed sticking it to Tubby and the program. Blamed his son giving us the middle finger on fans calling him a (inset N word) during games. How about Dedric punching some dude in the face at Kansas? KJ’s classy recording? Dedric running out on his Bar Louie tab (which turned out to be a misunderstanding, lol). This family is a piece of work and I’m glad to see them gone. If they were here, what would they be trying to extort out of the university now?

Tubby has had his share of failures, but getting rid of these losers isn’t one of them.

The Lawsons "stuck it to Tubby" because he demoted their State Championship winning coach and father to hire his dead weight son. I don't think it is extortion to expect the job you were promised. Again, Keelon has more Top 30 players in his immediate family than Tubby has landed in a decade.

Hiring relatives/AAU coaches/high school coaches/play cousins is not against NCAA rules and this happens all the time. Ever hear of Ronnie and Mario Chalmers?? Interesting that Ronnie resigned his position on the Kansas staff 4 months after Mario hit his famous shot in San Antonio.

Question, where does cheating on a National College Entrance exam, making it rain at the Plush Club, inciting a riot on Beale Street, hitting girl friends/baby momma's, Faux Fur Coat Gate, soliciting prostitutes, and theft of Goldsmith's gift cards rank in your morality barometer vs flipping the bird and walking on a bar tab? Do you harbor this much hate for Derrick Rose, Joey Dorsey, Jeremy Hunt, Robert Dozier, Clyde Wade, and Andre Allen as the Lawsons?

DAYUM.

Walk off.

(12-14-2017 06:21 PM)bluebacker Wrote:  I'm really starting to think we have several "too dumb to understand context" posters in this thread.........

I’m not sure you’d find one Memphis fan that would happy with the state of our program. But, instead of whining, just what do you think anyone here can do about it? I seriously doubt anyone one of us can pay his buyout.

Obviously, low attendance and poor basketball will get the attention of those that make the decisions. If you want a change to take place, I suggest that you may want to stop buying tickets, stop donating to TSF, etc.

We all know the program has cratered. It’s been going on for awhile. Historically, Tubby has been able to get his team to the tourney in three years. Unless he signs some good players, it looks doubtful that he can do it here.

I simply choose to support the program. I like this team, even if they aren’t incredibly talented. We could easily be 3-6 instead of 7-2. Look, I know that we have struggled against schools that we should dominate, but the team never quits. I don’t think I could say that last year.

Go ahead and whine if you choose.

(12-14-2017 05:47 PM)bariggins98 Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 04:26 PM)memtiger1987 Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 03:56 PM)bariggins98 Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 01:00 PM)72Tiger Wrote:  

(12-14-2017 12:27 PM)salukiblue Wrote:  Did you even listen?

Here's a part of the transcript. It isn't perfectly translated, so it's not precise word for word correct.

It sounds VERY well researched and thought out.

Seth laid out a lot of the things that we have laid out on this show. About misses in recruiting. The transfers. The tigers' loss at the end of last season. How the roster is well below any normal Memphis historical standard. Attendance is well below any normal Memphis historical standard, in fact the Memphis attendance inside FedEx Forum is at an all time low. A modern era low. The lowest of my lifetime and projects to finish that way. As well it's just it's all bad stuff. And I'm not even saying that enthusiastically.

Or I know because it's just all bad stuff. I'm sick. When Josh Pastner was nudged out the door to go to Georgia Tech, things were obviously not good in a variety of ways. Recruiting had dropped off transfers had picked, up the winning had slipped. Back to back misses for the NCAA tournament, none of that is is untrue. But we talked about it at the time. I was on record saying Josh Pastner and Memphis need to divorce. I thought that they were probably gonna have to be like a couple that stays married just because neither one of them can afford to be divorced. But then Georgia Tech's swooped in and Memphis lowered the buyout and was able to nudge Josh Pastner out the door.

Things were bad in that moment. That was a good day for the University of Memphis and a good day for Josh Pastner, I thought. That's all true. This is also true... in every way you measure a basketball program things have gotten worse since then: attendance, recruiting, season ticket sales, rankings-- everything. You know Josh Pastner's worst kenpom ranking ever was 90th. Tubby Smith's first team finished outside the top 100. Right now they're 152. In every way you measure a basketball program, the Memphis program has gotten incredibly worse in every department without exception since Tubby Smith took over.

This isn't even an argument anymore. I don't even understand how anybody could put up a counter argument to it. I can bring you all the numbers, all the facts. You can't argue against facts. At this point if you're arguing against anything that I'm saying you're either just stubborn to a fault, interested in just being different because you like to be different, or too dumb to understand the argument. You pick. It doesn't matter to me. I'll let you pick which of the three.

And what Seth was able to do is share that with a national audience, which is something frankly I had not done. I could've written this Memphis basketball column at any point. I don't have much interest in writing that for CBS sports now. I figure we'll get to a day where I will write it. And it'll have whatever impact it has. I sometimes people say oh you're gonna write another bad Memphis column I've written one that negative Tubby Smith column in my entire life or I should rephrase it I think I might have written one back when he was at Kentucky, but since Tubby Smith has been the head coach of the University of Memphis I've written one negative Tubby Smith--that's the truth-- and it was after the Lawson's left and they were losing all of the transfers and replacing them with sub 150 prospects. And junior college players.

The reason I wrote that column then is because I knew what this was gonna look like in November/December. I'm not a psychic, I'm just also not an idiot. So while some people were trying to spin it into "you know the Lawson's were a cancer and we'll be better off without them and you don't know how good the JUCO players will be". I consistently said you don't know what you're talking about. Here's what's coming and now here we are. And so, the only people pushing back now fall in the one of those categories" too stubborn to a fault, interested in being different for the sake of being different, or too dumb to understand the argument. Too dumb to understand context.

Anybody with a brain who understands the sport of college basketball looks at what's happening with the Memphis basketball program and reaches the same conclusion I reached the same conclusions that Seth Davis wrote. And detailed in that column this morning. There's no other way to interpret it. And yet there are still a few who will jump on Facebook or on Twitter and and there was one young guy on Facebook earlier today, after I posted that davis' column, and he said "Yo they beat Albany last night. They're 7-2 now. So what is the problem?" And the point I've made to him is yeah they're 7-2 but what does it mean?

Georgetown undefeated right now what does it me right now? Nothing. Doesn't meaning anything. When you are high major program with incredible resources who plays these types of buy games now you can make your record whatever you wanna make your record until conference play starts, then you've got to play who the league tells you to play. (Brad) "I watched Mississippi State get blown out by Cincinnati last last night." Another good example. Now Mississippi State has put together a nice record--they were undefeated. I had State fans tweeting me "why isn't state ranked? Because they had not done anything. But they've beaten nobody. Those wins don't mean anything. State might might prove to be a good team but don't let it undefeated record until yesterday make you think it's a good thing then they go play a real team for the first time in and they get handled pretty easily.

Memphis is the exact same situation right now it is true they beat Albany last night. Then I got a message last night--"what are you gonna say about this?" Good, okay I think? I guess I would say beating Albany is better than losing to Albany, so like congratulations. But. Wow if we got to a point where we're Memphis fans are celebrating--if we get to the point at this point you take any win you can take, I'm not trying to pretend otherwise. But if we reached the point wirh Memphis basketball where you're celebrating victories over America east schools and not even like the best American schools. Like you you're proving my points. You're proving my point. The issue with the last night isn't that Memphis beat Albany or that Memphis could've lost Albany. Whatever the result, whatever the result is a forty minute basketball game. The issue if you wanna get right to a core of it is that Memphis basketball was only a one point favorite over Albany. Inside FedEx Forum. That should never happen. Your program should never get to a place where all the metrics and Las Vegas oddsmakers say the University of Memphis is only a one point favorite or two point favorite over Albany. Inside FedEx Forum. Once that point spread is placed on that game that tells you all you need to know about the where the university of Memphis basketball program is right now.

It's what I've been saying for months is what's Davis wrote this morning. But 7-2. Some people are happy with it. Here's what I would tell you about that 7-2 record. The seven wins have come against Little Rock, New Orleans, northern Kentucky, Mercer, Samford, Bryant, and Albany. And four of those seven teams or I should take three of the seven teams were literally missing their best player. If you combine those teams--the seven teams that Memphis has beaten, you get an average kenpom ranking of 205.6. That's what the seven wins have come against. Against teams that have an average kenpom ranking of 205.6.

The seven teams that Memphis has beaten again--Little Rock, New Orleans, northern Kentucky, Mercer, Samford, Bryant, and Albany have so far combined to play eleven different top 100 kenpom teams. You wanna guess what the record is against those top 100 Kempom teams? They played eleven games and you wanna guess what the record is? Eleven games now. 0-11. They've played eleven top 100 kenpom teams--the teams that Memphis has beaten and they've lost every single time. So that's the context of the seven and two record it doesn't mean anything.

It's not even good relative to the very low preseason expectations. Ready for this--here's proof. In the preseason they were ranked at 132nd at kenpom. The University of Memphis Tigers were. 132, which by the way should never be the case of the University of Memphis. Josh Pastners lowest point wasn't anywhere close to 132 at kenpom. The low point where you wanted Josh Pastner fired and were willing to insist that the university should pay ten million dollars to make it happen. They were never close to 132 at kenpom, but that's where they were in the preseason this season. You know they are now after nine games? 151/152.

They've actually performed at a level below what they were expected to perform even relative to the preseason expectations that were already low. They are 3-4 against the spread. They've dropped thirty places in kenpom even with the wins, even by going 7-2. So there's no way to look at this information intelligently and try to spin it into something positive. That's a dumb man's game. I don't mind if you wanna be dumb. Just don't ever expect me to be dumb with you. You can be dumb if you want to and celebrate wins over Albany and try to pretend that the 7-2 record mean something. You can be dumb about it if you want to, just do it got ask me to be dumb with you. I'm not interested in that.

Now the good news is that on Saturday if you want to prove your a real team, you've got an opportunity. On a neutral court against a real opponent. I don't think louisville as good as it was supposed to be. A lot of that have to do with their highest rated freshman was ruled ineligible. And they replaced one of the greatest coaches of all time with a 32 year old first year head coach--you know like that matters. And so I don't think Louisville is a legitimate top ten team or top twenty or right now probably top 25 team. Louisville is still good, they've got good players. So if you think this is a formula that the University of Memphis is using, this is formula to be competitive at the level at which Memphis basketball is supposed to be competitive, at the level at which your program that pays the coach three million dollars a year is supposed to be competitive. Well, Saturday your opportunity to prove it. To be clear if they beat Louisville on Saturday. I will think it says more about Louisville than it says about Memphis. It won't make me change my big views about the Memphis basketball program. But at least you'll be able to say "don't say we can't beat anybody with this roster right doing it this way, we just knocked out the Louisville cardinals in New York." The opportunity's on Saturday we'll throw the ball up and play for forty minutes.

Thanks for the transcription. Parrish doesn't like 'Tubby ball' if you want to call it that. No matter the results, he wouldn't like it. Not his style and not something that is easy to write articles about because Tubby is not a media friendly coach.

I like 'Tubby ball'. By Tubby ball I mean the four year guys built up over time. I don't care too much about the big splash recruiting drama, don't follow any of that on twitter, look at rankings, etc.

That said, there are plenty of coaches who play 'Tubby ball'. We could have hired a better one IMO. We have Tubby tho, and I'd love for it to work. I'm a long term thinker by nature. I know I'm in the minority, and I'm not trying to change opinions.

Parrish is crapping all over Tubby. Been doing it -by his own admission - even before this season started. I don't care for it. It's lazy IMO. Write an article about the strengths and weaknesses of the team maybe? Or just throw a bunch of gas on the fire when it's good and hot and there are lots of eager faces looking to see how big the flames can get.

Final point - When we fire Tubby and go with a guy more like what everyone wants, I'll get on board with that. I just like this way better. It suits my style.

True, there are numerous coaches, some with less experience than Tubby, that are winning at NCAAT with 3 and 4 year guys and without the 5* splash ala, Kentucky, Duke, Kansas. GP actually named coaches who have a reputation of recruiting the "right way" that still land solid 3 and 4*s. He specifically mentioned Michigan, Wisconsin, UVA yesterday. There are also schools that hired new coaches the exact same time as Memphis hired Tubby. He's mentioned the recruiting wins by the staffs at Vandy, TCU, UNLV, hell even GaTech whose programs were all worse off than Memphis but have somehow been competitive and signed good recruiting classes.

GP is a lot of things, but lazy is not one of them. He has been "crapping" on Tubby because Tubby has run off 3 Top 100 players, demoted a coach that has more Top 20 players in his immediate family than Tubby has signed in the last decade. That's fine if you want to "do it your way", but when you run off "problem" talent, you better replace it with something. You and your staff better be working your ass off to land Top 30 recruiting classes considering the resources at your disposal. This staff was beaten out on the recruiting trail by Ouchita Baptist for heavens sake!! I don't know what's worse, the fact that our staff actually offered a kid who's only other offers were D-3, or that we LOST A RECRUITING BATTLE TO OUCHITA BAPTIST.

The real question is who in the hell thought this would be a good hire to begin with? 65 years old, had won 1 NCAAT game in a decade, who's average recruiting class was ranked in the 60s-70s and we wonder why we have the results we have. You didn't have to be Nostradamus to know how this was going to turn out.

Parrish worked hard on this? Look, it’s plain to anyone remotely associated with the program that we are in decline. Have been for years. Pastner poisoned the well locally. Memphis kids don’t want to come here anymore. Word gets out. Look at his transfers. He signs the Lawson’s because they hired their dad. They would have went elsewhere if he didn’t pay daddy.

Tubby has done nothing to improve this. Kids still don’t want to come here. No one cares about the good years (Calipari).

You mention the Matt Stanley deal. I’m not sure if he was offered, but my guess is that he was. Regardless, the kid totally backed off once he became torched publicly. Commercial appeal article, talk radio. Why would he come here after that? Add that to the fact that Memphis most likely pulled their offer.

I could care less about the Lawson’s. Those guys enjoyed sticking it to Tubby and the program. Blamed his son giving us the middle finger on fans calling him a (inset N word) during games. How about Dedric punching some dude in the face at Kansas? KJ’s classy recording? Dedric running out on his Bar Louie tab (which turned out to be a misunderstanding, lol). This family is a piece of work and I’m glad to see them gone. If they were here, what would they be trying to extort out of the university now?

Tubby has had his share of failures, but getting rid of these losers isn’t one of them.

The Lawsons "stuck it to Tubby" because he demoted their State Championship winning coach and father to hire his dead weight son. I don't think it is extortion to expect the job you were promised. Again, Keelon has more Top 30 players in his immediate family than Tubby has landed in a decade.

Hiring relatives/AAU coaches/high school coaches/play cousins is not against NCAA rules and this happens all the time. Ever hear of Ronnie and Mario Chalmers?? Interesting that Ronnie resigned his position on the Kansas staff 4 months after Mario hit his famous shot in San Antonio.

Question, where does cheating on a National College Entrance exam, making it rain at the Plush Club, inciting a riot on Beale Street, hitting girl friends/baby momma's, Faux Fur Coat Gate, soliciting prostitutes, and theft of Goldsmith's gift cards rank in your morality barometer vs flipping the bird and walking on a bar tab? Do you harbor this much hate for Derrick Rose, Joey Dorsey, Jeremy Hunt, Robert Dozier, Clyde Wade, and Andre Allen as the Lawsons?

You are talking about the antics of about 10 years of Memphis history by a litany of players. I’m talking about one family that stayed here a few years. Also, the antics you mentioned also came from teams that at least played at a high level. The Lawson’s never got us 20 wins.

I watched Keelons 12U team get it handed to them last week. Where are his other offers? He looked out of his league in 12U basketball!